The fourth-graders’ questions didn’t end there: “Do boys have babies?” “How do they roll up?” “Do they see the future?” “What do they eat?” “How big can they get?” “Do they have superpowers?” “Do they have a nose?” “How do you tell the difference between males and females?”

They probably didn’t appreciate how momentous their accomplishment was.

In a matter of minutes they had asked key questions about reproduction, nutrition, growth, movement, sensitivity, respiration and, yes, excretion: each of the seven life processes.

Teachers like Alyssa Park amaze us on a daily basis with how effectively they use the Question Formulation Technique to kindle curiosity while pursuing specific learning goals.

Educators often reach out to us on Twitter (@RightQuestion) in order to exchange ideas related to student questioning – conversations we value greatly. There’s not enough space to share every Tweet, but here are a few examples of excellent work conducted around the country and world, with an emphasis on STEM subjects. (See this earlier post for a Twitter roundup with social studies examples.)

Tish Mullen, a high school science teacher at Sandpoint High School in Idaho, confronted her students with a philosophical Question Focus: “Science is a way of understanding.”

Her students asked some thought-provoking questions: “Is science more harmful than useful?” “In what way can we use science to understand?” “What tools do we need to understand science?” “What was life like before we understood?” “Understanding what?”

Her class took a trip to Greenhouse Academy, which gives students hands-on experience growing plants and running a business. To prepare, she presented them with photos of Greenhouse Academy’s facilities.

Here are some of their questions: “What is this building’s purpose?” “What kind of plants are these?” “Is it” – the item depicted in the photo – “a water pump?”

Later in the week Cleland’s students figured out how to maximize productivity in the greenhouse. Some decided to write a poem comparing the experience to normal classroom learning: “At least bedrock, gravel and sand don’t make you raise your hand,” they observed.

In Minnesota, high school students in Marlene Schoeneck’s environmental science class, a college-level course, asked tough questions about the water crisis in Flint, Mich.

“Did they know the water was toxic before the water system was switched over?” “What is considered ‘healthy levels’ of lead?” “Why is Flint such a poverty stricken area?” “How has the water been treated now that the problem has been identified?”

Since we’re discussing potential hazards to people’s health, Christine Murphy presented an ominous Question Focus to her seventh-grade class in Hyde Park, N.Y.: “Many people live and farm on volcanoes.”

Not surprisingly, a handful of students asked the same question: “Why do people live on volcanoes?”

Murphy added a useful activity to the process of prioritizing questions. She made two push-pin boards. One was labeled “driving questions,” the other “question parking lot.” This allowed students to pin their top questions to the “driving” board without totally discarding the others, many of which were insightful.

Some other driving questions were, “Does it make a difference if you farmed on a volcano than on the ground?” And, “What happens if the volcano erupts?”

The Question Formulation Technique has now spread to more than 130 countries, and in South Africa Ms. Barzottini showed students some geometric shapes and figures. “Are the shapes similar or congruent?” they asked. “Why do the triangles look the same, but the numbers are not the same?”

Please keep Tweeting in our direction! You can find us at @RightQuestion, and many people use #QFT, the abbreviation for Question Formulation Technique. We love hearing about your work with student questions and inquiry. Also, visit us at rightquestion.org and join our Educator Network. We have more than 29,000 educators in the network and are trying to reach 30,000, so we invite you to join and share with colleagues.

Better Questions, Better Decisions, and a Stronger Democracy

We’ve been at work for more than 20 years teaching a strategy that helps people in low-income communities learn to advocate for themselves and their families. We have seen people use the strategy to advocate for their children at school, participate in decisions that affect them at the welfare office, secure better job training opportunities, and partner more effectively with their healthcare providers. We’ve also seen that the same strategy has universal value and has been used by college and graduate school students, professors, and professionals in various fields.

What is the “Right Question Strategy?” It is deceptively simple: Teach just two skills; how to ask your own questions and how to participate in decisions that affect you. We are often challenged to explain why these simple skills even need to be taught, and then, there are times when those who understand the full significance of these very sophisticated skills need to be convinced that they can even be taught.

We are seeing an explosion of implementation around the country in teaching the skill of question formulation. Since Harvard Education Press published Make Just One Change: Teach Students to Ask Their Own Questions in 2011, thousands of educators around the world have begun to teach their students how to ask their own questions. The results are students who are more engaged in their learning, take more ownership and learn more.

Learning “just” these two skills creates not only a pathway to success on many levels but also a pathway to full participation in democracy. We need more people capable of thinking for themselves and ready to make a contribution to building a more democratic and more just world.